Variation on a Theme, Book 6
Copyright© 2024 by Grey Wolf
Chapter 102: Juggling Commitments
Monday, February 24, 1986
I had no problem with my CS exam. Talking to the other members of the Contingent, including Angie, none of them had, either. That seemed to surprise at least Patty and Sam. They had clearly expected to have more trouble than they actually had.
Another thing about a good study group: you get pushed. If you can keep up in the group, the exam shouldn’t throw you for a loop.
I checked in with Amy at lunch. She was quite happy about Friday night and looking forward to whatever we did this week.
I also checked in with Darla. She very much wanted to get together this week. I thought we might make it a sleepover night, but didn’t tell her that yet. Surprises are good!
She was also going to the game tonight. After all, she was friends with Megan and knew Calvin at least a bit.
Amy was not. Basketball wasn’t her thing, or at least not yet. Nor were sports in general.
Things might start getting in the way of dating soon. Spring Break, Michael’s hiring process, and so forth. Easter, picking up our rings, Rendez-Vous Houston, and ... well. We had plenty of things going on.
For the moment, we were good. One-third of the spring semester was already gone, though, and I definitely wanted Darla to get everything she wanted out of it.
When I got home, there was a message waiting from Paula. She had drafts of most everything ready and wanted someone to pick them up tomorrow. We would review them all, make whatever changes we wanted, and get them back to her so she could finalize everything.
Everyone was thrilled with the progress. As far as we knew, there was no particular urgency to any of this, but who knew when that might change?
Penny, the CBS producer from the Rose Parade, also left a message. It wasn’t very specific at all. She just wanted us to know she hadn’t forgotten us, was still working on things, and hoped to have more for us in a few weeks.
Reading between the lines, she sounded both frustrated and optimistic. This was, after all, perhaps a ‘big break’ type situation for her if whoever-it-was bit on her proposal. She was motivated to keep working and it sounded like there was progress. Until she got a solid bite, though, she — and we — would stay in limbo.
Angie and I made good on our plan, booking one-hour calls with Jane on Saturday. We might try to have them once a month. That seemed like a good starting pace.
It wouldn’t be the same as seeing her in person, but it would help. Each of us had a lot to catch up on, really. Far too much for only a one-hour call.
But it would be a start.
Since it was a Monday night game, we met at the MSC cafeteria for dinner. Once that was done, we headed across the street to Jolly Rollie, arriving well before most fans.
Calvin was already on the court, warming up, when we got there. He spotted us and waved. We waved right back.
After taking a couple of free throws, he trotted over to where we were standing.
“Hey! How are y’all doing?” he said. “Man, it’s good to see you!”
Megan joined us as he was saying that.
“What he said! This is awesome!”
We all hugged each other. As had happened last year, Calvin introduced us to a few of his teammates as well. Unlike last year, Guy Lewis, UH’s head basketball coach (and a legend) came over to see what all of the fuss was about, so we wound up shaking his hand, too.
It got bigger still. Shelby Metcalf, A&M’s head coach (and also a legend, though nowhere near as successful as Guy), came over, too. He wanted to shake hands as well, so we did. He thought it was great that we were supporting our friend, even if he played for the other guys, and encouraged us to go to more A&M games.
We probably should, but I didn’t know if we would. Outside of football, we weren’t the most dedicated fans. Still, we should.
Calvin had to get back to workouts, but it was clear he was doing well and was at least somewhat of a leader on the team right now.
UH was having a rebuilding year, as predicted. They were currently 15-10, and 8-6 in conference. Not bad, but not where they had been. Calvin had been putting up decent numbers, which undoubtedly helped.
A&M, meanwhile, was doing very well this year and had a shot at winning the conference championship. I wished Calvin well, but I also hoped A&M would win.
Megan, meanwhile, was doing well as part of the UH women’s team. This was a rebuilding year for them, too, but they were in better shape than the men’s team and in the upper middle of the pack in conference play. She wasn’t perhaps a leader yet, but she was getting plenty of playing time and was making the most of it.
The game turned out to be a classic Southwest Conference game. That meant a lot of fouls, a lot of free throws, some really odd non-calls, and plenty of chances to yell at the refs. A&M wound up winning 81-79, with UH missing a tying shot in the final seconds.
Calvin wasn’t the one who missed that tying shot, thankfully. He’d scored 16 points, so I felt good for him. I felt good about the Aggie victory, too. Calvin knew we would cheer him on overall, just not when he was playing against the Aggies.
When we got home, Angie pulled me aside and said, “Tell me about Hank, Carl, and Paul.”
I did my best. I really didn’t know them that well, but I shared what I could.
She nodded along, asking a few questions along the way.
“Jibes with what I know. I know you don’t know Barbara, Patty, or Sam as well.”
“They’re new. I like them, though.”
“We have ideas. I really need to figure out how we get what we need. I want to say we interview them, but that’s ... it’s weird. Right, but weird. Still, that’s four guys — one, fine, might be kinda a special case — and two girls,” she said.
“Paul and Barbara are dating, I think. So that’s maybe one of each off the table. Hank and Patty tried, but they have no chemistry.”
“Good information! I won’t worry about Paul and Barbara as much. Carl ... there just aren’t a lot of black girls out there, and I’m pretty sure it matters.”
“Me, too,” I said.
“Really, Darla is the first priority, but we’ve got both guys and girls in some of the other study groups who are looking. Mostly not the Mercenaries. Some of those people...”
She shook her head.
“They need Dating 101 first. Seriously, some of them are trying to give Iceberg Steve a run for his money.”
“That bad?”
“They’re worse than Dave Mayrink was when he tried to pick up Jasmine, but also so paralyzed they could only think the come-on line, not say it. I want to say that’s better, because no feet go into mouths. But it’s also kinda worse, because the first hurdle is to get them to talk, but once they talk it’ll go horribly, so ... yeah.”
“I’d say to pair the nerdy guys and the nerdy girls, but...”
“Gender ratio is off and the nerdy girls are still ahead. Mostly. One of them, though...”
She rolled her eyes.
“That one — I won’t name names — is ... just ... oh, my God! She’s like ... Claire told me about that girl you guys sat with at AggieCon. This one is like ten times worse. The only things she can talk about are math and science fiction, and she’s obsessive about both. I can’t deal sometimes!”
“And yet, there are guys out there who would ignore all of that.”
She snorted.
“She’s not cute, either. But ... yeah. Even with that, some would just tune her out and be happy to be with any girl.”
“Sucks.”
“Probably no sucking going on around her anytime soon! I guess we’ll see. Anyway, none of your people seem hopeless. A couple of Mel’s bunch are ... eh. Lame. Maybe salvageable. The Business Brigade is mostly solid. We’ll get there,” she said.
“A labor of love.”
She giggled a bit.
“Or lust, or ... something. Anyway! It’s fun. Plus ... Darla. Darla is hard. The more guys I can look at to see if they have what she needs, the better.”
“Make sense to me!”
Tuesday, February 25, 1986
Over breakfast (no Candice and Sherry, but we only occasionally saw them for meals by now, anyway), Angie announced that she was hard at work moving money around. Any major purchases should go through her. If we had the money in our bank accounts, it wasn’t a problem. If we would have to sell stock or anything else, it might be.
Cammie and Mel nodded along. We hadn’t given them enough information to know what this was about. They just knew it was some investment.
We weren’t going to tell them, either. They would categorize it as part of Dell and not consider themselves to be involved.
I would make sure it benefited them, but it would be something along the way, not directly. There was already no way they would be in the position they were in without us, and they knew it, but we had made it clear that Camel was their company, not ours.
The money? Not so clear, but it was fair (by my standard of fair, anyway). Camel owed MNMS what MNMS had put in. 100% of the appreciation, rental profit, and everything else belonged to Camel.
I think Cammie had chosen to accept that in the spirit in which it was offered. She would get out of it what she put into it, and we would get our money back. That was fair enough for her.
Mel, too, but Mel was always the easier sell, because it wasn’t about her, really. It was about Cammie, and doing our best to put her on a solid footing, what with her parents being who they were. If we overachieved at that, so be it. That was fair enough.
Cammie and Mel might try to pay us back in some way. I could see them even offering us a percentage of Camel. That might honestly be fine, as long as it wasn’t a big percentage. That might make Camel our second venture capital deal, after P.C.’s Limited. Camel had a much slower growth path, but it might be a huge success itself. Hopefully, it would be!
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